Monday, June 1, 2020

The Virtual Library Bunch Episode 4: The Show Must Go On?

This is part of a series on the Library website and in the Daily Bulletin.

Over the last few episodes, you've seen how library staff have adapted to the new virtual environment. During this time, a few new members have joined our 115-person team. Please help us welcome them to the University of Waterloo.

Starting a new job can be overwhelming, especially if you are moving across the country. Two new library staff were anticipating these changes in March before beginning their new positions. Having moved from Nanaimo, B.C., Tim Turay, systems administrator (pictured left, middle row), worked one day in the library before the campus shut down. Antonio Muñoz Gómez, cataloguing and metadata librarian (pictured right, middle row), moved from Prince George, B.C. and started a week later.

Both Tim and Antonio have been adapting to their new work environment and navigating the learning curve that comes with any new job. Tim's unit has been working hard to get library staff set up at home with necessary tools and resources. This four-person unit thoroughly tests the products other library staff use in their jobs, ensuring staff can be effective and methodical as possible in their work. Antonio's department catalogues library resources, which appear in the Library’s search tool, Omni. He points out that it can be challenging to start a new job when you are not in close proximity to your colleagues. Both Tim and Antonio have been making use of various communication tools to connect with other library staff virtually, participating in virtual lunches and meetings, while also networking with colleagues from other universities.

Other new staff to the Library for the spring term are University of Waterloo co-op students. Jessica Bloom (pictured left, bottom row), Elita Depew (pictured middle, bottom row) and Akila Patel (pictured right, bottom row) are learning to navigate their work term virtually. All three identified the desire to talk to fellow library staff face to face and are looking forward to being in the physical library space. Elita and Akila have yet to set foot in Musagetes Library and are hoping to have the opportunity to explore this unique building!

All three are bringing their areas of interest and skills to the projects they are working on this term. Jessica is part of the Instructional Design team. She is working on her design skills by formatting information into learning objects to make information more accessible for students, stating:

"If designs are fluent and easy to follow and read, then students may feel more inclined to use that resource. Using a database properly could attribute to students succeeding on their paper or project. It excites me to know designing a page or a flow may aid in attaining information needed to achieve something really big and important."

For Musagetes Library, Elita is creating video tutorials, revamping the GIS for architecture library guide, and is designing a GIS social media campaign to educate students about what can be done with GIS, because "it’s more than just maps." Akila is creating a health and architecture social media takeover in July and is writing a project proposal about using gamification in the Library.

The virtual library bunch series has shed light on how the show IS still going on. Library staff are here, ready, willing and able to assist the campus. Get to know your friendly neighbourhood library staff and how we can assist you.

Here's the story of a lovely library
Providing online resources in a virtual world
All the staff had skills and knowledge to assist the campus,
Services and resources available in different ways

One day library staff started working from home (due to COVID -19)
And they knew that it was much more than a hunch
That this group must pivot to provide services virtually
That's the way we all became the Virtual Library Bunch

Written by Mary Lynne Bartlett (pictured right)

St. Jerome's University raises Pride flag

St. Jerome’s University (SJU) is marking the beginning of Pride Month (June) by raising an inclusive rainbow flag on its campus today. Interim President Dr. Scott Kline will be accompanied by the SJU Students’ Union President, members from the Academic Staff Association, and staff members—all in compliance with social distance requirements.

“At St. Jerome’s University, we are ‘committed to learning and academic excellence; the gospel values of love, truth, and justice; and the formation of leaders for the service of the community and the Church,’” Dr. Kline stated. “We teach and support a diverse student body, which is drawn from across the University of Waterloo campus. As an academic community rooted in the Catholic tradition, the virtue of hospitality provides direction to us. It calls us to reflect on how we treat our guests and to consider our place in the broader community.”

“In recent years, it had become painfully evident that our decision not to fly the Pride flag was sending the wrong message; namely, SJU was not a welcoming space for people who identified as LGBTQ+. This was never our intention and, in fact, that message contradicts our mission and dedication to being community builders. For us, the flag represents our commitment to our students and to all members of the SJU community. The time was right to provide a symbolic reminder that ‘all are welcome in this place.’”

Dr. Kline’s reference to the words of a hymn widely sung at SJU ceremonies aligns with the meaning of the action being taken. "All Are Welcome" was written in 1989 by Marty Haugen, a composer who spent 15 years as a full-time musician in Catholic parishes. The words of Haugen’s hymn “All Are Welcome” respects a Catholic identity that welcomes all.

St. Jerome’s University is a publicly funded Catholic university federated with the University of Waterloo. It was founded in 1865 by members of the Congregation of the Resurrection. St. Jerome’s is a member of Universities Canada, the Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities (USA), the Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities in Canada (ACCUC), and the International Federation of Catholic Universities (IFCU). St. Jerome’s co-registers approximately 800 students in the Faculty of Arts at the University of Waterloo and is home to 360 students who live in residence.

The University of Waterloo is also flying the Pride flag this month.

Apple acquires Waterloo-based AI start-up Inductiv

This article originally appeared on the Cheriton School of Computer Science website.

Waterloo-based Inductiv Inc., an AI start-up that uses machine learning to automate the task of identifying and correcting errors in data, has been bought by tech giant Apple.

Inductiv’s technology is based on HoloClean, an open-source statistical inference engine that uses artificial intelligence to identify and correct errors and omissions in data. This next generation of machine learning techniques to clean data began in 2017 as a collaborative academic project led by Cheriton School of Computer Science Professor Ihab Ilyas, and his colleagues Professors Theodoros Rekatsinas at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Christopher Ré at Stanford University.

According to a recent report by Bloomberg, Apple’s purchase of Inductiv is the second such acquisition in as many months aimed at improving the data used in Siri, a virtual assistant that’s part of Apple’s operating systems for its range of devices from iPhones, iPads and Apple Watches to Macs and Apple TV.

Clean and accurate data are critical components for successful machine learning, a type of artificial intelligence that helps software improve with minimal human intervention. Inductiv’s technology automates the process of correcting errors in data, allowing insights to be gained from real-world data, which is often noisy, incomplete and erroneous.

Inductiv was cofounded in 2019 by Professor Ilyas, who also served as Inductiv’s CEO, along with his collaborators Professors Rekatsinas and Ré. Inductiv’s engineering team was Ilyas’s graduate students Mina Farid, Omar Attia, Joshua McGrath and Ryan Clancy from the Cheriton School of Computer Science.

In a recent interview on CS-Can/Info-Can’s website about his approach to building systems based on problem-driven research, Ilyas said that “working with industry gives us access to problems that nobody else has, data and resources we don’t have. And in a research setting, we can explore it quickly. It might be normal for a non-academic entrepreneur to solve problems, but it’s important for an academic to know they’re solving someone’s problem.”

The University of Waterloo’s generous intellectual property policy, where the invention belongs to its inventor, has been instrumental in fostering entrepreneurial spirit for start-ups to become established and flourish.

Professor Ilyas also cofounded Tamr, a start-up focusing on large-scale data integration and cleaning, based in Boston, Massachusetts. He holds the Thomson Reuters-funded Research Chair in Data Cleaning from Theory to Practice at the University of Waterloo. He’s a blogger with O’Reilly and Towards Data Science, and gives lectures at industrial and academic conferences.

Free workplace yoga program continues in the spring term

A message from the Workplace Yoga Program.

Staff are invited to participate in the Free Workplace Yoga Program, which is currently happening virtually with our wonderful instructors Joshua (Kunga) and Eva. The program recently received funding for another academic year, with the Spring semester beginning the first week of June. Classes are at 12:05-12:55 pm on Tuesdays with Eva and Wednesday with Joshua. (We have found it is best to block off your calendar starting 15 minutes before class so you’re not booked for meetings that run into class time.)

To participate, subscribe to UWWorkplaceYogaProgram on YouTube. We are currently working out logistics for the eventual return to campus, so stay tuned for further details.

To subscribe to the Workplace Yoga Program mailing list, go to: https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/workplaceyogaprogram or for any questions, email workplaceyogaprogram@gmail.com

As a final note for the Wednesday classes, Joshua will be ‘starting fresh’ next week to help facilitate newcomers.

Namaste!

Notes as June begins

"Happy Pride 2020!" says a note from Human Rights, Equity and Inclusion (HREI). "We are excited to welcome in Pride 2020. While our current circumstances are anything but usual, we feel this Pride is an opportunity to celebrate, reflect, and engage in new and creative forms of community." 

"It is within this spirit that we are asking the #uWaterlooCommunity: What Does Pride Mean to You?"

Share your thoughts and photos via email to equity@uwaterloo.ca. For submission details visit: uwaterloo.ca/hrei/pride2020.

"We will share your photo and reflection on this page and on social media," says the note from HREI. "Watch for and share using #uWaterlooPRIDE. We look forward to hearing your stories."

Human Rights, Equity and Inclusion (HREI) is also hosting a new event this week. "In The Media unpacks what is current and now; what it means; why it’s important, and how we can respond," says a note from HREI. "In this edition, Amanda Cook and Meaghan Ross, from the Sexual Violence Prevention and Response Office, along with special guests, discuss the ‘Bellwoods Kiss’ – a video that went viral last weekend, and which resulted in a response video, and an apology from CTV, the broadcaster of the original footage. Join in on this roundtable discussion on Thursday, June 4 from 3:30 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. to unpack the many pieces of this complex incident, the responses it received, and what it all means. See the videos and register for the discussion.

Parking Services is letting staff and faculty know that the payroll-deducted parking fees continue to be waived for the month of June. "All staff who purchased a permit in office will receive a credit for months bought," says a note from Parking Services. 

Parking permit fees have been waived for the months of April, May and June.

Missing the "Good Buddies of the University" feature today? Don't worry, it will appear later this week.